1. Field
The invention relates generally to electronic documents, and more particularly to the review and approval of electronic documents.
2. Background
Modem computer systems are often coupled together into xe2x80x9cnetworksxe2x80x9d, e.g. groups of computers which may share information with one another. Networked computers may be coupled using various technologies well known in the art, including but not limited to copper lines, fiber optic cables, and wireless technologies such as radio frequency (RF) and infrared. A xe2x80x9ccomputer systemxe2x80x9d, as applied herein, is any device comprising a processor circuit coupled to a memory circuit, the memory circuit capable of storing signals representing operations and data. The operations may be referred to as xe2x80x9csoftwarexe2x80x9d. The processor may access memory and carry out, e.g. xe2x80x9cexecutexe2x80x9d, the software to transform or otherwise operate upon the data, in manners well known in the art. A typical computer network may comprise one or more computer systems operating as network xe2x80x9cclientsxe2x80x9d, and one or more computer systems operating as network xe2x80x9cserversxe2x80x9d. A xe2x80x9cserverxe2x80x9d computer system may supply, upon request, operations and/or data (resources) to a client computer system. The server typically supplies resources by executing software in response to signal(s) from the client, and by making the resource available to the client by way of the network, in manners well known in the art. Of course, those skilled in the art will appreciate that a particular computer system of a network may operate as either a client, a server, or both, depending upon the circumstances.
Electronic documents may be made available to others by way of a computer network. Electronic documents are collections of electrical signals. For example, an operator of a client may create a document using a word processing program, a spreadsheet program, a presentation program, and many other types of document authoring tools. The document may be made available to others by transferring, via a network, a copy of the document to a server, from which it may be accessed by other clients. Often, documents are stored and made available as electronic files.
Documents may contain sensitive information for which approval may be sought before the document is made available to the target parties. The approval process should allow multiple approvals to originate before the document is made available to the target parties.